What is Ac3-Passthrough?

[suss2it]

What exactly does AC3 Passthrough do? And what are the benefits of it? And is it possible to tell if a file that has an AAC track and an Ac3 if the Ac3 one is passthrough?

 

[waw74]

it passes the digital stream through without touching it. If you've got a stereo capable of handling the raw stream, you'll get surround sound.

if you play the file in VLC or quicktime, hit CMD-i, you can see what kind of audio it has.

 

[dynaflash]

is it possible to tell if a file that has an AAC track and an Ac3 if the Ac3 one is passthrough?

Well, if your talking about the appletv .. it can *only* pass through an ac3 track ... and only if your hooked up to an Ac3 capable receiver or tv. Otherwise it will play back the 2 channel aac track. If hooked up properly to an ac3 capable receiver your receiver should indicate the sound being used.